no 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST 
[August  r,  1892. 
formance  of  tasks  for  which  such  advances  had  been 
taken,  or  at  the  option  of  the  employer,  the  refund 
of  the  advance.  It  is  known  that  its  practical  effect, 
in  its  application  to  tea-garden  labour,  is  not  to  bring 
about  the  repayment  of  advances  ; for  these  are  usually 
of  trifling  amount,  and  their  refund  is  never  demanded. 
The  real  working  of  the  Act  is  to  punish,  by  a side  wind 
and  a manifest  distortion  of  its  o.iginal  purpose,  the 
offence  of  deserting  from  tea-gardens  after  entering  into 
an  agreement  to  labour.  The  Act  is  usually  applied,  not 
to  the  new  immigrants,  who  have  cost  the  employer 
large  sums  of  money,  and  upon  whose  labour  he  has 
just  and  equitable  claims,  as  the  only  possible  means 
of  recouping  his  expenditure,  but  to  time-expired 
labourers  who  are  induced  by  the  payment  of  an  ad- 
vance, not  usually  of  very  large  amount,  to  give  an 
agreement  to  labour  for  a term  of  days,  months,  or 
years.  All  these  considerations,  added  to  the  ex- 
pressed dislike  of  the  Secretary  of  State  to  the  appli- 
cation of  the  Act  to  tea-garden  labour,  constitute  a 
very  serious  indictment,  and  it  is  interesting  and  useful 
to  see  what  circumstances  have  induced  the  Govern- 
ment of  India  to  hold  fast  to  this  ancillary  and  in- 
direct means  of  preventing  the  desertion  of  labourers 
from  tea-gardens. 
In  the  first  place,  it  is  obvious  that  Lord  Cross’s 
distrust  of  the  Act  of  1859  is  largely  due  to  the  fact 
that  he  is  a trained  lawyer  and  law-maker.  It  is  ob. 
vions  that  to  a man  with  such  a training  and  with  the 
habits  of  thought  bred  of  it,  a law,  not  only  dan- 
gerously brief  and  summary  in  its  wording,  but  admit- 
tedly wrested  from  its  legitimate  purpose,  would  not 
present  itself  in  an  attractive  aspect.  But  it  is  not  on 
this  aspect  of  the  matter  that  Lord  Cross  dwells  io 
despatch.  He  looks  with  misgiving  to  the  possibility 
that  if  the  Act  of  1881  be  superseded,  or  if  it  bo 
administered  with  such  vigour  as  to  distasteful  to 
the  employers  of  labour,  the  older  Act  may  furnish  a 
loophole  of  escape  to  planters  who  find  it  necessary 
to  use  the  forms  of  law  to  prevent  their  labour  foroe 
from  df  sorting  them.  It  is  clear  that  there  is  force 
in  this  reasoning,  and  it  is  instructive  to  note  how  the 
Government  of  Indio  meet  and  parry  this  dialectical  diffi- 
culty. Their  answer  is,  in  effect,  an  appeal  to  experi- 
ence, and  is  therefore  ao  acceptance  of  the  views  of  the 
Government  of  Assam,  which  alone  has  opportuni- 
ties of  watching  the  working  of  the  two  laws  on 
the  spot,  In  effect,  the  Government  of  India  reply 
that  though  in  theory  Act  XIII.  in  1859  may  beinde- 
fensible,  in  practice  its  working  is  ou  the  whole  bene- 
ficial to  the  interests  of  the  cooli6.  Act  1 of  1882  is 
valued,  it  is  pointed  out,  cot  so  much  because  it  affords 
more  elaborate  and  more  striugent  means  of 
enforoiDg  discipline,  but  rather  because  it  concedes 
the  invaluable  privilege  of  private  arrest  of  runaways. 
Consequently,  on  gardens  which  are  much  subject  to 
desertion,  the  use  of  Act  I of  1882  is  imperative, 
especially  in  out  of  the  way  places  where  recourse  to 
magisterial  aid,  and  the  roundabout  process  of  sum- 
mons and  warrant  is  expensive  and  dilatory.  Hence 
it  happens  as  a matter  of  practice  and  experience, 
that  oontraots  to  labour  are  enfored  under  Act  XIII. 
of  1859,  chiefly  where  tea-gardens  are  favourably 
situated  from  a oooly’s  point  of  view,  and  where  the 
inducements  to  desert  are  merely  the  hope  of  getting 
better  wages  on  another  garden,  or  the  mere  love  of 
change  which  is  the  common  possession  of  human 
nature.  It  is  used  then,  chiefly  as  a means  of  pro- 
tecting the  employer  against  other  employers,  and  is 
supplemented  by  the  action  of  Tea  Associations  and 
the  force  of  public  opinion,  which  makes  it  more  or 
less  increditable  and  disgraceful  for  one  employer 
to  help  himself  to  the  labourers  of  another. 
Practically,  therefore,  Act  XIII.  of  1859  is  used  in 
gardens  which  are  popular  among  time-expired  coolies, 
men  who  have  had  some  experience  of  the  conditions 
of  life  io  Assam,  and  may  be  safely  deemed  to  be 
able  to  take  care  of  themselves.  To  such  gardens  as 
these  it  were  a waste  of  energy  to  apply  the  elaborate 
provisions  of  the  newer  Aot.  Again,  proseoutioDS 
under  Act  XIII.  of  1859  are  comparatively  rare,  the 
punishments  inflicted  are  noticeably  lighter,  and  it 
seems  probable  that  the  Aot  is  used  simply  as  a 
means  of  preventing  coolies  from  taking  advances  in 
cne  garden  :.fter  another  with  no  intention  whatever 
of  performing  their  share  of  the  bargain. 
It  must  be  admitted  that  all  this  is  a strong, 
practical  answer  to  merely  theoretical  obji  ctions 
to  the  Aot,  objections  whioh  may  be  summed  up 
in  two  observations — firstly,  that  the  Act  was 
framed  to  meet  a different  state  of  things  from 
tha»  to  which  it  has  been  applied  ; and,  eeoondly, 
that  its  working  is  one-sided  and  binds  tbe 
employer  to  no  duty  whatever  other  than  the 
payment  of  a small  advance.  It  does  not  even, 
it  must  be  remtm^red,  expressly  provide  for 
the  payment  of  wages.  It  seems  likely,  indeed, 
that  the  Act  as  originally  framed,  contemplated 
the  advancee  whole  sum  due  for  the  performance 
of  a stipulated  tax.  But  in  practice  a magistrate 
would  doubtless  refuse  to  enforce  a contraot  under  Act 
XIII.  of  1859,uulees  tbe  wages  usually  mentioned  in  the 
contract  were  duly  paid.  Experience,  therefore,  shows 
that  tbe  Governmentcf  India  are  rightin  holding  that 
the  short  and  simple  provisions  of  Act  XIII.  of  1859, 
practically  furnish  a steppiDg-stoue  towards  the 
freedom  of  contract,  the  untrammelled  migration,  and 
tbe  abolition  of  the  penal  conditions  of  the  contraot 
which  is  its  avowed  aim.  The  Aot  which  the  Secretary 
of  State  views  with  charaoteristio  distrust  - the  dis- 
trust of  a man  of  business  who  likes  theory  and  prac- 
tice to  agree,  furnishes  one  more  example  of  the  fact 
that  the  most  elaborately  and  anxiously  compiled 
enactments  often  fallsbortof  the  hopes  of  legislators, 
while  judicial  and  executive  discretion  can  use  as  a 
useful  tool  laws  which  at  first-sight  bristle  with  oppor- 
tunities for  mischief.  And  this  must  always,  especially 
be  the  case  in  India,  where  legislation  is  the  work  of 
men  not  always  in  touch  with  the  needs  of  those  for 
whom  they  legislate.  It  is  often  well  to  leave  subsi- 
diary details  to  the  administrators  by  whom  Indian 
laws  are  enforced,  and  of  this  fact  the  Government  of 
India  have,  consciously  or  unconsciously,  furnished  one 
more  instance. 
Admitting  all  this,  it  is  well  that  all  who  are  in- 
terested in  the  prosperity  of  the  tea-gardens  of  Assam, 
should  remember  that  a Tory  Secretary  of  State  has 
laid  down,  in  a declaration  which  shows  absolutely 
no  sign  of  being  framed  to  court  popular  favour  on 
the  eve  of  a dissolution  of  Parliament,  that  a system 
of  enforcing  contracts  to  labour  by  fine  and  imprison- 
ment is  not  one  whioh  commends  itself  to  civilised 
governments.  It  seems  to  ns  to  be  tbe  obvious  duty 
of  employers  of  labour  to  restrict  the  use  of  the 
Labour  Law  within  as  narrow  limits  as  possible,  lest 
they  should  one  day  be  non-plnssed  by  the  liberation 
of  their  coolies  from  the  peDal  necessity  to  labour. 
The  matter  has  now  been  discussed  ad  nauseam,.  The 
theory  that  planters  require  to  be  recouped  the  cost  of 
importing  coolies,  has  been  proved  to  apply  only  to 
newly  imported  coolies,  and  is  therefore  no  agreement 
for  putting  time-expired  labourers  under  penal 
contracts.  It  has  been  tacitly  admitted  that  the 
maintenance  of  the  tea  industry  depends  upon 
penally  enforced  contracts  extending  over  loDg  terms 
of  years.  It  is  a system  which  can  only  be  defended 
on  the  ground,  expressly  and  repeatedly  urged  by  the 
Government  of  India,  backed  up  by  the  quoted  opin- 
ions of  missionaries  and  offioials,  that  after  all  the 
state  of  labourers  imported  into  Assam  is  better,  (in 
mauy  cases  it  would  seem  incomparably  better)  than 
that  of  the  friends  they  leave  behind  in  the  poverty 
stricken  hovels  of  Behar  and  Orissa,  and  of  the  ea*t- 
ern  districts  of  these  Provinces.  Against  this  must 
be  set  off,  as  the  Government  in  India  very  candidly 
admit,  the  excessive  mortality  among  new  immigrants 
into  Assam.  This  point  has  been  noted  by  the  Sec- 
retary of  State,  who,  in  the  language  of  common- 
sense,  seems  to  say — “Very  well,  you  may  go  on 
as  you  are  for  the  present,  but  you  really  must  try 
and  reduce  the  mortality.”  Whether  this  can  be 
done,  remains  to  be  seem  In  one  respect,  Assam  is 
more  favourably  situated  from  a sanitary  point  of 
view  than  in  former  days.  There  can  be  but 
little  extension  of  tea  cultivation  with  so  bad  a market 
for  tea  as  has  prevailed  during  recent  years,  and 
it  seems  to  bo  the  opinion  of  the  best  judges  that 
